Jason Nickerson

Tampa, Florida is well known for invasions, from snowbirds to pirates, Tampa has been a winter getaway and vacation spot for countless years. Over the past two years, Tampa has also become known as the largest JoomlaDay in North America. The combination of easy access from the Islands, South America, and Europe and a break from the winter cold for our friends in the North has made JoomlaDay Florida a premier Joomla event.

In just three short years JoomlaDay Florida has become the premier Joomla event in the United States and has grown from a single day to the current three-day event that includes workshops and certification. To be honest, it wasn't as hard as expected; the USA has far less JoomlaDay's than Europe and some of the largest have been dormant for the past few years. Still, we are honored and feel blessed to have the support of the Joomla community. As we lead up to our 2018 event, I would like to share with you how we created JoomlaDay Florida!

2017 is on the way out, and now we are looking forward to a very bright year for web design and Joomla! Design styles over the past few years have been shifting toward the more minimal model, and the web is looking very standardized at the moment, but some new and familiar trends will make a significant impact in 2018.

In the past two years, Joomla's outreach has grown beyond the usual JWC, JAB and JoomlaDay's by working with several hosting conferences. Joomla's first experience at HostingCon Global 2016 gave us great insight into the current perception of the project, fantastic advice from media and hosting experts, and opened the door to new sponsorship for the project. This one event showed us how important our visibility outside the core community could be.

CMS Summit will bring together developers, integrators, designers, experts, and users with other Merge attendees ranging from start-ups, hosting companies, funding, digital media and legal experts to domain owners looking for advice and help with launching their site. The conference will offer much more than sessions and training by creating a unique networking situation to drive business and commerce.

Joomla! returned to HostingCon Global for our second appearance with high expectations. Last year we made our debut at HostingCon Global and HostingCon Europe and discovered how important it is for Joomla to attend these type of events.

Joomla! is making its first appearance at the Davinci Faire and BarCamp in Sarasota, Florida. The event draws more than 600 people from across the gulf coast gathered at the Manatee Technical College to talk tech and show off their latest creations.

JoomlaDay's are an excellent way to unite our community on a local level and this year's JoomlaDay Florida went far beyond Florida. Joomlers from across the United States, South American, Canada, Europe, and Jamaica took part in the two-day Joomla showcase.

The second annual JoomlaDay Florida takes place on February 25th and 26th 2017 in Tampa, FL. While winter dominates the rest of the United States, Florida is the perfect location to hold a JoomlaDay during the winter months.